KARACHI, April 30: Two young workers of the Pakistan People’s Party were killed in Lyari on Tuesday while they were busy making arrangements for a corner meeting in the area as part of the ongoing election campaign in an armed attack that also left two men and a nine-year-old girl wounded, police and party sources said.

They said that six men on two motorbikes targeted Haji Guddu and Niaz Tajuddin near Mirza Adam Khan Road when they were sitting on the corner of a street after putting up party flags in the area.

The intense firing also left two men, Mohammad Tasleem and Mohammad Saleem, and a nine-year-old girl, Ruqayya, wounded.

“The motive for the firing is not yet clear,” said SP-Lyari Najam Tareen. “The attackers were on motorbikes, and we have talked to people from different parties in the area and they are blaming rival groups for the deadly incident. The investigations are in a very early phase and it would be too early to reach any conclusion.”

Though the police authorities sounded reluctant to blame political reasons as the motive for the deadly attack, the PPP candidate for the Sindh Assembly from the constituency was sure that “political rivals” in the “PPP stronghold” were attacking his workers to keep the party away from the electoral process.

“There is a corner meeting scheduled for Wednesday and the attack was carried out to sabotage that activity,” said Javed Nagori, the PPP candidate from PS-108. “But we are not scared and would carry on our plans. The PPP workers and candidates are under severe threat in this area as our rivals know that they can win from every part of Karachi but not from here. So they have chosen the brutal way to eliminate us from Lyari.”

ST activist gunned down

As the tension prevailed in Lyari, armed attackers struck again in North Karachi and this time the victims were Sunni Tehreek workers.

The area police said that armed men fired shots at 35-year-old Faraz Qadri and 30-year-old Qamar Qadri near the Power House roundabout.

“Both were shifted to the Abbasi Shaheed Hospital, where Faraz died from the wounds. The victims were residents of Sector 8 North Karachi and associated with the Sunni Tehreek,” said an official.

Earlier, a pickup driver was gunned down in the Malir area. The area police said that armed men fired shots at 50-year-old Ghulam Muhammad near Bijju Farms while he was driving to home.

“The victim was a resident of Agra Taj Colony and owned a Suzuki pickup,” said an official at the Memon Goth police station. “He used to visit this area for his transportation work. He was intercepted by armed riders and it’s still not clear if it was a mugging attempt or deliberate murder.”

Tension gripped parts of the old city area after the killing of a young man in an armed attack on a chemical shop in Kharadar. The area police said that armed men on a motorbike fired multiple shots at Gharib Nawaz Chemical in Nanak Wara along the Napier Road. “The firing left 35-year-old Abdul Qadir critically wounded and later he died from the wounds in the Civil Hospital during treatment. The victim was a resident of the Pan Mandi area and worked at the shop as a salesman,” said an official at the Kharadar police station.

Three bullet-riddled bodies were found in different areas. All the victims remained unidentified.

In the early hours of the day a young man, apparently in his mid-20s, was found shot dead near the Mira Naka bridge within the remit of the Shershah police station. A few minutes later the body of another young man was found in the Mewashah graveyard within the remit of the Pak Colony police station.

In the second half of the day, an aged man was found shot dead in the Pakhtunabad area of the Manghopir police station. The body was moved to the Edhi morgue after medico-legal formalities at the Abbasi Shaheed Hospital for want of identification.